Excerpt: Adam McKay proves himself an adroit chronicler of more serious stories than ‘Step Brothers’ with this unlikely but oddly effective mixture of dark comedy, character study, based-on-a-true-story drama, rabble-rousing, and detective story. Like ‘Steve Jobs,’ this is a movie in love with the sound of shoptalk, its characters yelling, joking, prodding, and chattering their way around anyone who can’t keep up.

Excerpt: an illuminating film, equal parts horror and hilarity. With Steve Carell leading one of the finest ensembles of the year, “The Big Short” entertains while explaining just what happened to those who don’t know the difference between a stock and a bond

Excerpt: McKay tries to do for the financial crisis what Traffic and Fast Food Nation did for the drug war and fast food, but since the principle cast consists entirely of white dudes in suits, most of whom end up reiterating the same pieces of information, its attempts at thoroughness feel half-hearted.

Excerpt: Director Adam McKay (“Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy,” “Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby,” “Step Brothers,” “The Other Guys”) may have seemed like an unlikely choice for this material, but his freewheeling style, coupled with the script’s scathing wit and boisterous irreverence, mirror the indignation and contempt the audience is likely to feel for the banker’s gray pinstripe establishment that engineered this disaster in the first place.

Excerpt: Director Adam McKay wants you to get upset; he want you to walk out of the theater outraged Wall Street crooks got away with it all and will most likely do it again. The Big Short is here to scare you, to perplex you, and guarantees you will talk about it for days afterward.

Excerpt: While there are times McKay’s film is enjoyable to watch, and while the performances are decent and the writing can be solid from time to time, there are too many stumbles and hitches along the way that prevent it from picking up steam. It is tough to call The Big Short a failure because it never stops being interesting and its heart is squarely in the right place, but it does not succeed in its goals.

Excerpt: Yes they’re caricatures when all is said and done, but that type of satirical bent on an insane truth is what allows us laypeople to enter with confidence. McKay and Randolph dumb things down by continuously breaking the fourth wall so the story can be told as an anecdote rather than thesis number-crunch.

Excerpt: The system itself is designed to be so complex that even those inside of it don’t fully comprehend it. “Sound confusing?” Gosling’s character asks us. “That’s the point.” But what The Big Short does exceptionally well is explain the basics in layman’s terms.